Anti-Israel activists, including Harvard University’s Lara Jirmanus, a clinical instructor, seem to struggle with the concept of “discrimination.” Quoted in a May 14 MassLive article, “Harvard ‘failed to respond’ to 450 discrimination complaints. Staff hand-delivered them again,” Jirmanus complains that Harvard has taken “utterly discriminatory” actions against Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian people, including by “eliminating the[ir] speech.”

How so? The article’s author, Juliet Schulman-Hall, cites as an example: “Harvard School of Public Health cut ties with Birzeit University in the West Bank amid repeated claims that the university was tied to Hamas…”

Consider the irony.

Jirmanus is a known supporter of the anti-Israel academic boycott movement. She is a member of Harvard’s Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine, which “endorse[s] the 2005 call issued by Palestinian civil society for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions” against Israel and declares it is “focused on boycotts of Israeli academic institutions…”

In fact, Jirmanus so fervently supports the anti-Israel boycott movement that she has pledged to boycott even those universities which are insufficiently anti-Israel. In an April 2024 statement, Jirmanus pledged to boycott Columbia University and Barnard College over the arrest of anti-Israel students who occupied and vandalized university property and even held staff members hostage.

Notice the fundamental distinction between Harvard’s decision to cut ties with Birzeit University and the Jirmanus-endorsed anti-Israel academic boycott movement. Birzeit University was individually selected because it is a Hamas stronghold. For example, as CAMERA has previously pointed out, Birzeit University is actively providing material support to the internationally designated terrorist organization.

On the other hand, the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel targets academic institutions by virtue of their being Israeli, i.e., based entirely on their national identity.

What is more offensive and “utterly discriminatory”: boycotting a specific institution because of its harboring of and material support for a terrorist organization, or boycotting an entire category of institutions on the basis of their national identity?

The obvious answer, it seems, evades Jirmanus.

Students at Swarthmore College are so close to understanding the conflict.

An article in the Swarthmore Phoenix details the frustrations of student activists with the college’s Students for Justice in Palestine.

The gist of their criticism is that SJP’s tactics do not appear designed to accomplish results. According to the paper, “[a] recurrent criticism expressed by activists…was the perception that SJP had little interest in convincing or even talking with those on the fence or opposed to their goals.” SJP, according to some of the students interviewed, has adopted an “adversarial tone towards the general student body” and “ridicules” anyone who does not espouse absolute fealty to the most extreme of positions.

Among those extreme positions, espoused in an SJP membership application form: “Palestinians have a right to resist the occupation of their land.”

Those students interviewed by the Swarthmore Phoenix expressed confusion about the tactics. One of the students claimed that “SJP is unambiguously ineffective at achieving its stated goals,” while another suggested that the Swarthmore anti-Israel boycott campaign is now further out of reach because of SJP’s tactics.

Perhaps their confusion stems from a mistaken belief that anything SJP does is actually meant to benefit the Palestinian people, rather than deny the Jewish people their right to self-determination and Jewish students their right to enjoy university life without antisemitic and anti-Israel extremism.

Don’t take my word for it. SJP’s response to the Swarthmore Phoenix says it all: “The issues being addressed by this national movement are not ‘Palestinian issues’ but rather Zionism, the largest moral crisis of our lifetime.”

It’s not about supporting Palestinian self-determination – it’s about opposing Jewish self-determination. It’s not about Palestinian rights; it’s about describing the vast majority of Jews around the world as “the largest moral crisis of our lifetime.”

A 1935 Der Sturmer billboard with a subheading reading: “The Jews are our misfortune.”

The sooner well-meaning but ill-informed students start taking extremist organizations like SJP for their word, the closer we’ll be toward improving the lives of both Israelis and Palestinians.